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The History Wars

Stuart Macintyre, Anna Clark

A new edition of the book that sparked months of intense debate about the way historians, politicians and others choose to interpret the Australian story.

The nation's history has probably never been more politicised than it is today. Politicians, journalists, columnists, academics and Australians from all walks of life argue passionately—and often, ideologically—about the significance of the national story: the cherished ideal of the 'fair go', the much contested facts of Indigenous dispossession, the Anzac legend, and the nation's strategic alliance with the United States. Historians have become both combatants and casualties in this war of words.

In The History Wars, Stuart Macintyre and Anna Clark explore how this intense public debate has polarised the nation and paralysed history departments. This edition includes a new afterword by Stuart Macintyre which recounts, with rueful irony, the outbreak of controversy that followed the book's original publication, and the further light it shed on the uses and abuses of Australian history.

The nation's history has probably never been more politicised than it is today. Politicians, journalists, columnists, academics and Australians from all walks of life argue passionately—and often, ideologically—about the significance of the national story: the cherished ideal of the 'fair go', the much contested facts of Indigenous dispossession, the Anzac legend, and the nation's strategic alliance with the United States. Historians have become both combatants and casualties in this war of words.

In The History Wars, Stuart Macintyre and Anna Clark explore how this intense public debate has polarised the nation and paralysed history departments. This edition includes a new afterword by Stuart Macintyre which recounts, with rueful irony, the outbreak of controversy that followed the book's original publication, and the further light it shed on the uses and abuses of Australian history.

“

The History Wars is very important. The book will sit on the shelves of libraries as a code stone to help people understand the motivations of players in today's contemporary debate. It sheds light on the political battle which is carried on in the pubs and on the footpaths about who we are and what has become of us. ”

Paul Keating

Stuart Macintyre

Stuart Macintyre is Ernest Scott Professor of History at the University of Melbourne. His previous works include A Proletarian Science, Winners and Losers: The Pursuit of Social Justice in Australian History, Volume 4 of the Oxford History of Australia and A Colonial Liberalism.

Anna Clark

Anna Clark is an Australian Research Council Future Fellow at the Australian Centre for Public History at the University of Technology Sydney. She has written extensively on history education, historiography and historical consciousness, including Teaching the Nation: Politics and Pedagogy in Australian History (2006); History’s Children: History Wars in the Classroom (2008); Private Lives, Public History (2016); The History Wars (2003) with Stuart Macintyre, as well as two history books for children, Convicted! and Explored!…